1. Field
The present invention is comprised of an analog computer method which calculates modulation transfer functions (MTFs) of various detector shapes as a function of detector orientation with respect to the in-scan direction of a scanning thermal image system, and is specifically an analog method based on the observation that the mathematics of Fraunhofer diffraction is related to the problem of computing detector MTFs.
2. Prior Art
No prior art is known for calculating detector MTFs for arbitrary shaped detectors which are scanned in an arbitrary direction. An MTF expression was developed for an arbitrary shaped detector with the in-scan direction along the x-axis in a co-pending U.S. patent application Ser. No. 07/637,045 filed 1/08/91 by the present co-inventors, entitled "Development of General Modulation Transfer Function". The present invention is involved in a MTF expression for an arbitrary shaped detector scanned at an arbitrary angle from the x-axis.
Finding the limits of integration for an arbitrary shaped detector for all detector orientations, with respect to the scan direction, can become complicated. Thus, a need exists to compute detector MTF for arbitrary shape detector for arbitrary in-scan direction.